Armand-Jean Le Bouthillier de Rancé, (born Jan. 9, 1626, Paris, Fr.—died Oct. 27, 1700, Soligny-la-Trappe) French abbot who revived the Cistercian abbey of La Trappe, influenced the establishment of several important monasteries, and founded the reformed Cistercians, called Trappists, a community practicing extreme austerity of diet, penitential exercises, and, except for chanting, absolute silence.

Of noble birth, Rancé became commendatory abbot (a benefice granted to a secular clerk for life) of La Trappe. Between 1657 and 1660 he turned from a worldly to a spiritual life, giving up his possessions and benefices.

In 1664 he became regular abbot of La Trappe and devoted himself to reforming the Cistercian order. In 1678 Rancé obtained papal approval of his reform, which spread widely. His staunchness, the physical and psychological demands he made upon his followers (he regarded ugliness and squalor as integral to poverty), and his outspoken criticism of less austere religious orders, however, provoked hostility and led him into a heated controversy with the learned French Maurist (Benedictine scholar) Jean Mabillon.

In his Traité de la sainteté et des devoirs de la vie monastique (1683; “Treatise on the Holiness and the Duties of the Monastic Life”) Rancé attacked learning—the central activity of the Maurists—as being contrary to the spirit of monastic life, which he believed should be confined to prayer and manual labour.

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a branch of the Roman Catholic Cistercians, founded by the converted courtier Armand de Rancé (1626–1700), who had governed the Cistercian abbey of La Trappe in France, which he transformed (1662) into a community practicing extreme austerity of diet, penitential exercises, and...

...took place in France during the 16th and 17th centuries. The most noteworthy reform, because it resulted in a split observance that endures to this day, is traced especially to the efforts of Armand-Jean Le Bouthillier de Rancé, who became abbot of La Trappe in 1664. He was so successful in restoring a well-balanced rule of silence, prayer, manual labour, and seclusion from the...

In 1691 Mabillon had to defend the Maurists’ mode of living against Abbot de Rancé of La Trappe, Fr. (founder of the reformed Cistercians called Trappists), who favoured manual work for monks. The ensuing dispute caused Mabillon to write (1691–92) Traité des études monastiques (“Treatise on Monastic Studies”) and Réflexions sur la...